A/N: Wow! Thanks you guys! And to answer your question Joey Bing, I was thinking about her trying to find another way, but it just ended up with her not doing it. And I didn't want her to climb back over because Vaughn would've just stopped her again, right? I know it's a little weird, but I just didn't kill her off. Yet. ::devilish smile:: I'm not sure where this is going to go from here on out, and I'm warning you in advance, if I continue, it's going to be really *really* slow, so bear with me. Anyway, this was also sitting in my computer as an epilogue, I was planning on making it longer, but if you guys would like me to keep going I figured I might as well just change it altogether. Again, thanks so much! Your reviews mean a lot ^_^
Four Little Words
It's been months now. More than a year. I don't stop thinking about what I've done, I can't help thinking it was taking the easy way out. But when I think about it more, about my decision, I know I didn't have a choice. It was an impossible situation that I would have ended up loosing anyway. Knowing that doesn't stop me from feeling that unbearable agony of missing my friends and father. Nor does knowing that make it any worse.
Do I wish I could go back? Of course I do. I wish I could go back through the passages of time, back to that night I was waiting for Vaughn. No, before that even. I wish I could go back to the time that Francie was going to be killed. There wouldn't have been a fight. There wouldn't have been two years gone. Though I know now that the removal of my memory was of my own accord. I also know that all of the Covenant's attempts have been futile in "bringing forth" Rambaldi in his second coming. Why? Because I was there to destroy them all. There are certain perks in finding my mother again. But that is for another day. I'm not certain why I write these. They're all burned in the end.
Sydney wadded the paper up and threw it furiously into the fire. The sun was blindingly absent for the moment, the birds and their annoying songs had ceased, both settling in for a long, lonely night. The only light present was that burning from the gyrating flames that occupied her fireplace, and the music that wafted to her ears was of a wailing violin, crawling up and down a scale, making the saddest music she'd heard in her entire thirty-two years on earth. Some Russian composer, obviously someone who knew how to write a decent piece of depressing music.
She'd thought that in the two years she'd been missing, things had changed dramatically. She almost doesn't believe how much of an extreme it's gotten to this time. Her hair was a few shades redder, though not without the brown, from staying hours in Austrian sunshine. Her skin was a shade darker. Just as last time though, she was in a house that would never be home, with friends she didn't have anymore, and possessions she'd acquired recently, and not kept since her adolescent years. The most relevant distinction perhaps, was that instead of having her father to lean on, she had her mother.
Having escaped the torturous life she'd begun so long ago, she'd found herself entranced by Austria's radiance. After weeks of flying from country to country, she was ready to plant her roots here, perhaps to grow in serenity and find ways to erase the past from her mind. And grow she did, blossoming and thriving like a flower in the beginning, changing and wilting as time went on, before shining brilliantly again. It was, once more, her season of dying. This very Sunday marked October 1st. Tears would fall, and she would remember. Go over every conversation, every emotion, every thing that ever went on between herself and Vaughn... And then she'd recover and continue.
It pained her to think of him, she missed him so much, it was nearly intolerable. But he'd chosen his path, and she'd been forced to take her own. She's glad he caught her, that he stopped her from going through with her life altering decision. Though it doesn't change the fact she's also so furious with him for doing so. After that night, when she'd walked away from him on the pier, she didn't know what to do. Or think. Or feel. She was still so numb. Vaughn had stopped her from committing suicide, and because of it she'd had some sense shaken into her. She wouldn't try it again that night. Not daring to go back to her house, she'd drifted, without thinking, back to her old home. It was no longer laying in it's ashes, as had been described to her by a picture, but was a blank patch of grass laying between two other homes. The rain was still coming down angrily as she made her way, almost in a trance, to the spot her front door had once occupied. Going through the motions mechanically, she twists the doorknob that isn't there, into the foyer that has long since disappeared. Time slips and she's no longer standing in the middle of chaos, but stepping back into her reality, where Francie is sitting on the couch after a long day at work, and Will is scrounging through the fridge.
She smiles at the nothing that surrounds her, and greets the people who have been gone for years. Dropping imaginary keys onto an invisible counter, she lets go of the handle of her suitcase, walking down the two steps into the living room. Flopping down onto her couch of grass, she sits Indian-style, leaning backwards slightly. I am so burned, she says to empty space. 12 hours back and forth for a long meeting with a boring client. Francie looks up. Syd, I'm telling you, you need to quit that job. It's going to be the death of you.
Fran, I can't just quit. This is important to me. Anyways, I'm going to bed, I've got the day off tomorrow, and I am taking full advantage of it. Night Will, she says aloud as she gets off the couch and walks down the hall to her bedroom. But as she walks, the color fades in front of her, Will and Francie's voices die away, and the wonderful illusion she'd been under diminishes. She realizes she's standing exactly where her bed used to be. To the left, is where the double Francie had fallen. To the right, was where Sydney Bristow had made her final stand. She remembers the times before that last night. When she'd first moved in after loosing, no killing, her fiancé. Hearing Charlie propose to Francie. Playing those ridiculous card games with Charlie, Will, Jenny, and Francie. Taking off her engagement ring with Francie after learning what a pompous jackass Charlie was. Talking with her father on the front porch. Getting the call that Will was being held, and would be freed only if a ransom was to be paid. Covering all her bruises in the bathroom. The birthday party she'd planned with Will for Francie. Taking care of the bullet wound, courtesy of her mother. Vaughn picking her up. Making dinner for Vaughn, but not eating until the next afternoon. She falls to her knees, sobbing openly. And the rain continues to fall, as if nothing has happened at all. As if it is crying for her itself.
For hours the sobs would wrack her body, fading and then returning full force as memories hit her with the force of a dump truck. She doesn't remember getting up, she doesn't remember how she got her clothes or so-called valuables, everything was a blur after that. Her memory is only coherent a few days before finding her house in Salzburg.
Relaying her mind back to the present, her eyes begin to glaze over with tears. Her house- it could never be a home- is too big for her. It has two bedrooms, a master bedroom, two bathrooms, a large kitchen with no one but herself to eat it, a living and dining room with no one but herself to occupy. There weren't enough people to fill the rooms. Sitting on the couch, she realizes something. I am so alone. And she's still not sure if she's happy to be alive.